the murders matter, period. not because of who committed them. that's my closing. thank you for watching. "cnn tonight with don lemon" starts right now. >> you said that much more eloquently than i said it in just a couple seconds with you. >> true. >> you're absolutely right with that. again, it's awful, our hearts do go out to those families. i mean, no one can imagine, even wants to man the kind of pain they're dealing with right now. >> listen, it is the kind of thing that keeps any parent up at night. none of us are supposed to outlive our kids and when they are stolen from us, in a way that should not have happened, that could have been prevented, you have every right to be outraged and the community does as well. we're seeing that in iowa. but that doesn't give people the right to abuse its significance. and use it to play to something else, and the president taking a moment like this to make a video where he says she was permanently separated, it's not a time to play politics about something that he did wrong. that's doubling down on doing the wrong thing.

>> well, you know what newt gingrich told axios, right? he said if mollie tibbetts is household name by october, democrats will be in deep trouble. if we -- if we can be blocked by manafort, cohen, et cetera, then gop could lose house badly. that's an admission that is kind of a talking point, don't you think. >> it's 100%. i mean, it's more proof of the obvious, my brother, people want to divide. you know where i am on that. diversity is the strength of this place. our unity, our interdependence, interconnectedness, has always won out. they have to be careful about that. >> i do know that. you live it. you had a great show. i'll see you tomorrow. thank you, chris. this is "cnn tonight." i'm don lemon. the white house is reeling in the wake of what may have been the worst day of the trump presidency so far. okay? former trump campaign chairman paul manafort in a virginia jail tonight awaiting sentencing on

eight counts of financial crimes that could put him behind bars for the rest of his life. "the new york times" is reporting tonight that the president and rudy giuliani have discussion e discussed the potential fallout of a manafort pardon. more on that in a moment. you want to stay tuneded. and it coming as michael cohen, trump's former fixer and keeper of secrets, is out on a half million dollars bond after his guilty plea on eight charges including two about breaking campaign finance laws. breaking campaign finance laws. keep that in mind. it's important. and the president is desperately trying to spin that. but what he says is absolute nonsense. i want you to listen to how he answered when he was asked today whether he knew about payments meant to silence stormy daniels and karen mcdougal who both claim they had affairs with trump. >> later on, i knew. later on. but you have to understand, what

he did, and they weren't taken o ut of campaign finance, that's a big thing. that's much bigger thing. did they come out of the campaign? is they didn't come out of the campai campaign. they came from me. it isn't even a campaign violation. >> what the president appears to be claiming there is completely untrue, which would mean it was false and a lie. you can't duck campaign finance laws simply by paying out of your own pocket. that's a crime. a crime that michael cohen pleaded guilty to yesterday. a crime cohen says he committed at the direction of donald trump. here's what he said in if court yesterday. and i quote, "on or about the summer of 2016,court yesterday. and i quote, "on or about the summer of 2016, in coordination with and at the direction of a candidate for federal office, i and the ceo of a media company at the request of the candidate worked together to keep an individual with information that

would have harmful to the candidate and to the campaign from publicly disclosing this information." so michael cohen is referring there to paying for the rights to karen mcdougal's story. and there's more. this is a quote. "on or about october of 2016, in coordination with and at the direction of the same candidate, i arranged to make a payment to a second individual with information that would be harmful to the candidate and to the campaign to keep the individual from disclosing the information." that's a reference to the hush money payment to stormy daniels. and if that is not clear enough, there's this. the judge asking, "mr. cohen, when you took all of these acts that you described, did you know that what you were doing was wrong and illegal?"

cohen answering, "yes, your honor." and as to the president's claim he only knew about the payments later on, his own words prove that that's a lie. listen to trump and michael cohen discussing payment to silence karen mcdougal. >> correct. so i'm all over that. and i spoke to allan about it. when it comes time to the financing which will be -- >> listen, what financing? >> we'll have to pay -- >> pay with cash. >> no, no, no, no, i got -- >> but i didn't know beforehand even though i discussed with with my attorney and fixer beforehand. confronted with the fact that trump is heard on tape discussing the payment before it was made, sarah sanders simply refused to answer the question from cnn's kaitlan collins. >> in his interview today the president said he found out about those payments michael cohen made later on, but he's on

tape discussing how to make one of the payments with michael cohen. so before the payment was made. so how do you explain that? >> once again, identi've commenn this pretty ex-tense tentensiv. the president did nothing wrong, there are no charges against him, there's to collusion. for anything beyond that, i would refer you to the president's outside counsel. >> didn't he just say he didn't know about it them there's a tape of him during, before it happened, discussing it? okay. again, michael cohen is alleging that trump committed a crime. and directing cohen to pay to silence women to claim that they had affairs with trump, paying them in order to influence the election. that is collusion. then you might think that republican lawmakers would feel compelled to speak out in the face of all of this. actually, it probably won't surprise you at all to hear that the response from the president's own party is pretty much this.

crickets. deafening silence. nothing. senate majority leader mitch mcconnell completely silent. majority whip john cornyn? >> i don't know the facts. >> don't know the facts. house speaker paul ryan punting to his spokesperson who said, "we need more information than is currently available at this point." and then there's this from the longest serving living senator, orrin hatch. >> naturally, it makes you very concerned, but, you know, the president shouldn't be held responsible for the actions of people that he's trusted. >> again, the point here is that michael cohen in his allocution said that donald trump directed him to make the illegal payments. we can and should hold the

president responsible for that. it may not be much of a surprise, though, that republicans don't want to do that, but the president has got to be wondering tonight what will happen if a blue wave crashes over capitol hill come november? let's discuss. i want to bring in now cnn white house correspondent kaitlan collins who asked that question. she's with us. also jonathan, the "new york" magazine and susan hennessey, cnn national security and legal analyst. good evening to all of you. kaitlan, you were there today. you asked the question to sarah sanders. what's the mood inside the white house tonight? >> don, you saw it there best, the white house is having a lot of trouble mounting a defense in response to the claims made by michael cohen. essentially saying what they said in the past, that the president did nothing wrong, these charges aren't against him and then saying there is no collusion even though that's unrelated to what michael cohen said when he was in a new york courtroom yesterday. so we're seeing a lot of struggle here on behalf of the

white house, but a lot of that comes because of things the own president has said in the past to his press secretaries including sarah sanders, like when he told her he had no knowledge of those payments about stormy daniels. something that she said definitively from the podium here in march citing a conversation that she had with the president and then, of course, we found out later on from rudy giuliani that the president did, in fact, know about it. but, don, what we know is the mood inside this west wing, it goes two ways. "a," we know the president is in a bad mood. he doesn't like that this happened. he wasn't expecting michael cohen to make that statement in court yesterday. when his lead attorney, rudy giuliani, is currently out of the country. that's something that's irking the president. as far as those who work in the west wing, they don't know how to react to this because, of course, they don't know what the president says is correct or if he's right when he says he didn't direct michael cohen to make those payments. but also, they've weathered storms like this before. back with rob porter in the security clearances. with the trump tower meeting.

with the stormy daniels payment revelations. they don't know if this is a story that's going to be the one that breaks the camel's back, so they're kind of sitting back waiting to see what it is that's going to happen here. >> let's bring jonathan chate in. jonathan, after denying knowledge of this hush money, these hush money payments in april, president trump now says he did know about them. i can't keep it straight. whether he knew or didn't know, but he didn't know about them then added later on. did he do himself any favors today? >> no, because his admission was actually a confession. he trieded to say, well, it only would have mattered if the much came out of the campaign but he actually got it totally backwards. the problem, the violation, was that he took the money from the trump organization and donated it to the campaign. that's the illegally and he just misdescribed the law, so i think he thinks he was doing himself a favor, but he was actually hurting himself. >> yeah. susan, so, by saying on fox, by

the way, that he knew about the payments, is he creating even more legal problems for himself? >> i think potentially he is. look, at this point, you know, the question of whether or not the president didn't know, i think it's sort of -- it strains belief, right, not only was michael cohen willing to say this under oath, you know, he has tapes that essentially corroborate his account. it's also significant that prosecutors allowed him to say this in court during his allocution. prosecutors would not and could not have allowed michael cohen to make the statement which they would have coordinated in advance unless they had reason too believe it was true. so the notion here that we're not sure whether or not the president was aware or not, you know, i think it's relatively apparent at this point. you know, to the point that jonathan made, i do think the president may have gotten himself into additional legal trouble in that interview today. he appears to be confused about the law. he's emphasizing that campaign funds were not used for these payments. however, if campaign funds were

used, he actually might have been okay. so long as they were reported. the actual violation here is that a private individual and a corporation made illegal campaign funds, so once again, i don't know if he's relying on bad legal counsel or simply doesn't understand what they've explained to him, but i don't think he's doing himself any favors at aull. >> i'm seeing head nods in agreement from jonathan and kaitlan. this is a new report by "the new york times" saen the report says trump and his lawyer, rudy giuliani, have discussed the potential political repercussions of pardoning paul manafort. giuliani tells the "times" that trump thinks manafort has been horribly treated. what are your thoughts on this one? >> we know president trump is enamored with the pardon power. this is one of the powers in which trump does get to act like a king, he's sort of above the law. this is his exclusive power. i think he is concerned about paul manafort cooperating from this point forward. that verdict was just sort of the beginning for manafort. he's facing an entirely

different trial that's coming up here in washington, d.c., in september. you know, and i think what we're seeing through these statements is trump sort of testing the waters. seeing if he can talk about manafort in sympathetic terms, what kind of pushback he's going to get from congressional republicans essentially to see whether or not he's going to get away with it. what we've seen in response has been pretty much nothing. some sort of tsk, tsking and shrugs from republicans but not drawing a line around trump pardoning individuals directly implicated in this investigation. >> i have to tell you, vieveryo trying to figure it out. the "times" is reporting, no, they're not going to do it. they talked about it but he's not considering it. he told ainsley airhart of fox, well, there's a possibility. there is a disconnect there, kaitlan, with the reporting on this. >> reporter: there is. that's what rudy giuliani says. his one account of this. then it's clear here's what the president is saying during an interview on the white house grounds today.

and of course, that also comes after sarah sanders in the briefing room today said there had been no discussion that she was aware of if a potential pardon for paul manafort here. of course, the president, himself, all you have to do is look at his twitter feed, he's signaling that he could potentially pardon him. sem sem essentially saying he wasn't treated fairly by the justice system even though paul manafort got a jury, yeah, a trial by a jury of his peers, and even his own attorneys said they felt that was a fair trial that he received over the last few weeks but the president is doubting the justice system today and signaling to paul manafort saying that at least he didn't break calling him a brave man. obviously a stark contrast to what he thinks michael cohen has done. but it does, don, go to show you what the president is saying to his own staff including sarah sanders, that no, he's never considered pardoning paul manafort. what he's saying to his legal team, his lead attorney, rudy giuliani, and what he is saying to a cable news host about potentially pardoning his former campaign chairman.

>> oh, boy. all right. >> can i add a point to this? >> yeah, quickly because i want to get to michael cohen. there's new information. go ahead, john. >> the big point is it's wildly improper for the president to be floating a parting of someone who could be testifying against his own criminal involvement. >> right. right. right. >> go on. >> yes. thank you. thank you. >> never considered a proper use of presidential power. >> all right. let's talk about this because within la when last we heard of the president speaking of michael cohen it was a flippant tweet this morning saying, you know, if you want to hire -- i'm p paraphrasing here, a competent attorney, don't hire michael cohen. surprising that you would hear the president of the united states or see the president of the united states tweet something like that. but tonight, he is speaking about his relationship with michael cohen. listen. >> are you considering pardoning paul manafort? >> i have great respect for what he's done in terms of what he's gone through. you know, he worked for ronald reagan for years. he worked for bob dole.

he worked, i guess his firm worked for mccain. he worked for many, many people. many, many years. and i would say what he did, some of the charges they threw against him, every consultant, every lobbyist in washington probably does. if you look at hillary clinton's person, you take a look at the people that work for hillary clinton, look at the crimes that clinton did. with the e-mails and she deletes 33,000 e-mails after she gets a issubpoena from congress and th justice department does nothing about it? and all of the other crimes that they've done. >> okay. so that was about paul manafort. we have the michael cohen. that deserves -- so much fact checking in that i don't have three hours to do when it comes to the 33,000 e-mails and the crimes that have already been discussed. there were hearings held on all of this stuff. hillary clinton is the president in his head. and probably in the head of the folks who work for fox news.

he's talking as inin ining abou by him saying, susan, it's something every lobbyist in washington has done, that's not true, either. >> i think it's not true and there has been some confusion about sort of the scope of fora. this is a man who stood up in front of the united states of america and swore an oath to take care that the laws be faithfully executed and now we have him in an interview, one, implying that breaking the law is not a big deal, it's something that everybody does and shouldn't be held responsible for it. the same time, we have him tweeting, actually praising someone for failing to cooperate and provide information with federal investigators. so, you know, just the brazen breach of the oath of office, it really is stunning to see something like this unfolding sort of in plain view. >> did you want to say something about that, jonathan? >> no, i think she hit the nail on the head.

paul manafort was much worse than other lobbyists and the main point is he was working for russia. he was working to advance russian interests in other countries. he did it in ukraine, he does it other soviet republics and seems like he did the same thing in the united states. >> so why this obsession with hillary clinton and her e-mails, kaitlan? i mean, i guess it's a strategy on his part and on the part of his supporters because every time there's something wrong that's not explainable, that hurts the president, um, hillary, uh, e-mails, uh, obama. like, it's reflexive. >> reporter: truly, and it's not just a defense tactic for the president. he truly believes that hillary clinton has not been prosecuted in the way that she should. you see there at the end of that clip, he's saying this justice department. he's referring to his own justice department with the attorney general jeff sessions who the president hand picked, same with rod rosenstein, the deputy attorney general, chris

wray,director, all these people are the people the president picked to run the justice system here in washington. his justice system that he's in charge of. that goes back to all of his anger. he can only focus on that. the jeff sessions recusal which is one of the things that irritated the president the most the entire time he's been in office since last march when jeff sessions first recused himself. that's something he zeroed in on. as the skrcrutiny heightened around the president, his aides, former aides including paul manafort, former allies including michael cohen, the more that that is in the news and the headlines, the more he thinks about hillary clinton and when she did and wants that the to be equally looked at and scrutinized as he is. of course, he's the one who is the pvt, not hillary clinton. he's the one occupying the white house right here behind me. but the president doesn't seem to grasp that. he seems to think hillary clinton should be treated the exact same way that he is and she's guilty of the same things that anyone he's associated with has been as well. so you see that because the president doesn't like the scrutiny on him that he's getting from the justice

department. >> yeah. >> reporter: it's just something that has really consumed the president the entire time he's been in office, don. >> okay. so, listen, i love having just the facts on this show. i promise the viewers, we'll give you just the facts. okay? clinton staff -- this is a politifact. this is one of the fact checks. . if you read the fact checks, viewers, you will know what i'm talking about. clinton staff received a subpoena for benghazi-related e-mails march 4th. employee managing deleted 33,000 e-mail e-mails. the fbi found no evidence that the e-mails were deleted delibera deliberately. clinton's team requested for the a ma e-mails to be deleted months before subpoena came. and requested all the e-mails relative to the subpoena had already been turned over to the state department. read it for yourself if you don't believe me. use your google machines. thank you, all, appreciate it. we will be back. i'm going to talk about the president's relationship with michael cohen. among other things. david axelrod is here.

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breaking news, president trump speaking out tonight about his former fixer and keeper of secrets, michael cohen. let's discuss, cnn senior political commentator david axelrod is here. david, good evening to you. we're getting something new in on the president talking about michael cohen. his relationship with his former attorney. let's listen. >> michael cohen, tell me about your relationship with him. >> well, he was a lawyer for me for one of many many, you know, they always say the lawyer and then they like to add, the

fixer. well, i don't know if he was a fixer. i don't know where that term came from, but he's been a lawyer for me. didn't do big deals. did small deals. not somebody that was with me that much. you know, they make it sound like i didn't live without him. i understood michael cohen very well. he -- what turned out, h e wasnt a very good lawyer, frankly. he was somebody who was probably with me for about ten years and i would see him sometimes. >> why would he have a not very good lawyer working for him for ten years? >> it's a very good question, don, especially a guy who says he only gets the best and the brightest around him. and of course, the reason he had him around was to handle assignments like the assignment of trying to get stormy daniels and karen mcdougal to step down. to stay silent. i mean, that's the kind of assignle that michael cohen took

up for the president. so he knows very well why he had michael cohen around and the kinds of things that he assigned to him. >> yeah. so, will you answer me this, david, you worked in the obama administration, you've seen what it's like inside the white house on a day-to-day basis in times of crisis. what do you think it's like inside the white house now? >> let me just qualify this by saying i don't think there's ever been a white house quite like this white house. maybe the nixon white house at the end, but, you know, this is -- this is like nothing -- this is suey genaris. when things happened, we never had ethical scandals like this but certainly have events that happened, crises around the world or things like that. and you feel like it's, water is flowing in from everywhere. you feel like you're under siege. and i can only imagine what they feel like in the white house now that they've had plenty of practice over the last couple of

years. but it seems like this has reached a different kind of inflection point. and, you know, i think it's interesting to watch sarah sanders try and parry these questions because there's no way to justify this set of facts and it's almost as if she's given up trying. she just dismisses the questions and moves on partly because i think she's been burned so many times by asserting things that turned out not to be true. >> you mentioned the unique nature of this administration, but, and the -- as i said in my open, david, the silence is deafening coming from republicans, from lawmakers in washington on the republican side. is this president going to pay any immediate political price for being implicated in a crime? >> well, i think that the immediate political price that he may pay will come in november at the polls. you know, i think his base is his base. i think when he said, i can stand on 5th avenue and shoot

someone and my people will still stick with me, i think that that was about right. and he has a political base that is an implimplacable base. people who don't have a cult-like fascination with donald trump but might be open for voting for republicans. think he placed a heavy load on the wagon of every republican who's running in any of these swing districts. i have to believe there's an enormous amount of concern about it and you will see, i think, in some of those districts some republicans speaking out but the b bul bulk of those republicans in congress run in districts that are dominated by one party, the republican party, and feel the president's power within that base so they're reluctant to speak out. >> it's always -- what's been

perplexing to me is that he stands by and people stand by, at least supporters, can shoot someone in the middle of 5th avenue as if that's some sort of badge of honor. can you imagine being a supporter of someone and them saying that? that would be insulting to me. do you think i'm that stupid? >> yeah, you know, i agree with that, although i think he's proven himself -- he's proven right about -- about that. i just want to harken, i'm old enough to remember the water wae days, don. some viewers will remember how that ended. it ended because senior republicans walked down to the white house and told the president it was over. >> get out. >> after he was named as an unindicted co-conspirator. and he did. that was before the days of fox news and social media and breitbart and, you know, hannity, and this kind of -- the sort of silos that we live in

today, but, you know, you do -- you would like to see people stand up at some point and take a position on this because, you know, this is -- this is a major five-alarm constitutional crisis at this point. >> i go the to play this from fox news. just to finish my point, just that he's basically saying to you if you're a supporter, stand on 5th avenue, he can tell you anything and you'll buy it, he can do anything and you'll buy it. that is an insult. that's not respect when someone says i can do whatever, break the law, kill somebody, and you're still going to like me? i don't -- most rational people, no. >> don, there's something -- go ahead. i'm sorry. >> that's okay. because i want to play this for you before we run out of time. if you have time, we can respond. this is a bit of the president's interview with fox that's going to air in full tomorrow morning. he suggests president obama also committed a campaign finance violation. here it is. >> and you look at president obama, he had a massive campaign

vi violation, but he had a different attorney general and they viewed it a lot differently. >> okay. so, what do you think? >> there were -- the obama campaign had technical violations in 2008 for which they paid a $360,000 fine. they did not ask a -- they did not pay -- essentially pay up hush money to keep women from speaking out in a way that might damage the campaign. there's no corollary here. this is the difference between a parking ticket and a fundamental crime. and to compare the two, i mean, but this moral relativism is what he does. everybody does what manafort did, no, everybody doesn't do what manafort does. he was involved in bank fraud, tax evasion, millions of dollars he made working for a russian aparachic in ukraine and hid the money. he says everybody does what he did with michael cohen in this case. that is not true.

it is not true that everybody meets with russians to get dirt on their opponent. that is not true. okay? and so when he says that, he's offensive to the facts and to the truth and to what all of us who've been involved if politics all of these years and in government know to be the truth. >> yeah. so that is his out card and his supporters do apparently accept that or some of them do. that is the line that's being pounded over there on fox tonight. but there is truth and there are facts and he's on the wrong side of them. >> but, you know, the thing you said, a clerical error and the obama administration, not the administration, the -- >> the campaign. >> the amount was so high is because the number -- the amount of money they had received -- >> millions of contributions. >> guess what happened in november of 2016, the fec hit the trump campaign with 1,100 errors totaling roughly $1.3 million.

similar. >> don, here's an important point. i know we have to go out, but the guy who was on the fec at the time who he can talk with about this when the obama fines were levied is don mcgahn, now his white house counsel. these matters weren't referred to law enforcement because day were technical violations that are common in campaigns. >> yeah. we have more later in the show. thank you, david. i appreciate it. thanks for bringing the fact the and the truth. we'll see you next time. we'll be right back.

republican leaders on capitol hill largely silent today on the convictions of michael cohen and paul manafort and what it could all mean for president trump. so let's talk about it with cnn's senior political an lialy

david gergen who an adviser to four presidents and mark mn kickkic mckinnon, former adviser to george w. bush and john mccain. hello to all of you. mark, good to see you. haven't seen you in a while. david, i see you all the time and wie love having you. once again, the most vocal, senator orrin hatch saying these are serious charges and they can't be ignored. >> yeah, good for him. i've known orrin hatch for decades and have high regard for him and the fact he's starting to speak up i think is good, but the overall general republican response of this has been extraordinarily weak. it's been very conscious. some would say cowardly. and i think unless they wake up and smell the coffee, they're going to face massive losses in the political elections to come. it's worth remembering as republicans what hatch ehappene watergate. president nixon left office that august of 1974 after some

republicans had stood up like howard baker, told him he had to leave. for a long time the republican party was cautious then before some people started waking up and what happened in the midterm elections after nixon left just a few month s late e the democrats picked up 49 seats in the house and won 5 senate seats. day went on to win the general election with jimmy carter in 1980. so they paid a fearsome price -- i'm sorry, in 1976, and they paid a faearsome price as a pary and this is going to hurt the party especially among millennials and women and minor it i ities unless they address it soon. >> several top republicans did try their best to avoid the questions today. let's listen. >> all we know about it is that he's bled guilty and everything else that you asking me is speculation. i don't think i should be speculating.

>> i don't know nothing about it to, again, the process is just beginning and i think we ought to let it -- >> naturally, it makes you very concerned, but, you know, the president shouldn't be held responsible for the actions of people that he trusted. >> mr. cohen's credibility's going to be challenged is my best guess. >> so, mark, is republican silence on these serious allegations at their peril, you think? >> certainly so and it's not going to hold as this evidence mounts and there's going to be a lot more between now and election day in terms of what we know has happened. we're beginning to see some cracks in the republican wall. among even some of the congressional folks like tom cole from oklahoma who used to run the congressional committee as a pollster, very smart guy. he's speaking up and advising other candidates that they need to speak up. what's happening now is the democrats are getting a clear and compelling message about a culture of corruption. not impeachment. a culture of corruption. the president's campaign manager, deputy campaign manager, his national security

adviser, his personal lawyer, now have all either -- are either convicted or admitted felons. to that's a powerful weapon for the democrats. if i could just read you a very interesting statement by trump right before the election last time, he said, "a vote for hillary is a vote to surrender our government to public corruption, cronyism, that threatens the very foundations of our constitutional system. what makes us exceptional is we are a nation of laws. public corruption is a grave and profound threat to our democr y democracy. spreads outward like a cancer and affects the operation of government, itself. if the corruption is not removed, the people are not able to have faith in their government." that was donald trump. so it's coming back on him. >> what you said. >> that's, again -- yeah. so that's a problem. >> yeah. that is -- that is a problem. do you think, david, that any republican members of congress, i mean, seriously, do you think that they will be frank with this president and tell him how bad his position really is?

>> i think the numbers start to crumble for him, especially with his base. let's say the overall approval rating and you see the gap widening for the midterms, preferences for the midterms. i think at that point, yes, there will be conversations of a more serious nature. i think they'll be quite hidden. i think what the republicans really have to do, don, is take it upon themselves in congress to take some action. first and foremost, they ought to pass, you know, a bill which protects the special counsel. i mean, this is ludicrous to leave him hanging out there zbli. >> right. >> they ought to pass a resolution urging the president to be cautious about pardons instead of dangling pardons in the fox interview in regard to manafort. they ought to urge the president to go testify, himself. do this if a clean way and the republican party can survive it, but if they don't get their heads up and it's right for the country. i mean, they owe it to the country to be tougher on this. >> the -- david, yes, but mark,

will that ever happen? and, listen, i agree. something should be done. do you think that will ever happen, mark? >> well, no. i don't think it's going to happen. in fact, you know, elizabeth warren is the one that's filing that kind of legislation which is a smart move on her part, but david's right, there's a reason that david worked for four presidents. that's good advice. >> it is. >> get out in front of what's happening. >> right. >> the ship is about to hit the iceberg. throw some missiles at the ice and reform packages about protecting the special counsel like he suggested. some of the stuff elizabeth warren has talked about, frankly, tax reform, candidates for president should have to disclose their taxes. that sort of thing should be i think the sort of thing republicans who are normally reformers in those sort of financial things should be out front, not leading from behind. >> before you said, iceberg, i thought you said something else. if you had said, hit the fan, i'd be like, whoa, wait, what

kind of fan are we show are we ? thank you, gentlemen, i appreciate it. >> the iceberg is hitting the fan. bass pro shops and cabela's

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president trump backed into a corner tonight in the wake of the plea deal from the former attorney michael cohen. or at least the guilty plea. and the conviction of his former campaign chairman paul manafort. let's discuss now, cnn contributor, frank bruni is here of "the new york times." also cnn contributor michael he thing, lanny davis said there is no deal. he pled guilty and the only agreement is he wants to tell the truth and wants to correct the record. so that's what he cesaid. there is no deal. sarah sanders today saying, well, someone who makes a plea deal, there's no plea deal. >> no. >> not bargaining with anyone. >> i spoke with a lawyer today who's represented a lot of organized crime figures and there's a good analogy here. i think that prosecutors are

looking at the trump organization as an organized crime operation. and there's a lot of speculation that the meeting at trump tower with the russian attorney was likely bugged. someone could have entered that meeting wearing a wire. >> wow. >> so why would anyone need cohen's cooperation on this? this is -- there's no deal left to be made because they have all the proof they need. >> i just want to get the reaction to something, frank, that they said, okay? what i said. lanny davis said "as of today there's no plea deal. michael agreed to plead guilty to the charges. there have been no discussions thus far about lenient sentences or anything else. the only deal is, michael cohen's decision to take responsibility, accept punishment and tell the truth to everyone who wants to hear. what sarah sanders said was false false." then he said, "i challenge her to come on your show with you, don, and i would say to her we're not at the white house

podium, we're on don lemon's show where we have to tell the truth, so what do you know or what are you guessing? there is a difference." what do you say to that? >> i want to say -- >> that was on the record. lanny told me i could use that. >> first of all, sarah sanders at this point is saying so many ridiculous things that i wonder why we even talk about her. i know that sounds terribly disrespectful. i talked to you about this. i wonder why people are even going to briefings anymore because what she's saying from the podium is soer releva er ri diversi diversionary. lanny davis. that chapter of this isn't over. i get the impression listening to danny davis as he goes around town and gets the impression reading the tea leaves that there may be mueller has something he wants to talk about. conversations taking place that we don't know about that aren't formalizeded in the matter of a trade deal. >> speaking of conversations we don't know about, also omarosa

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my guests are back with me. so much to discuss. not just michael cohen who has had the recording. it was omarosa who released several secret recordings, said to me she had hundreds. james comey took detailed notes of their private interactions. he demands loyalty but what is about it him that people want to record and take notes because, what? >> because he's a relentlessly predatory creature. he consumes everybody and exploits every situation to its

maximum for himself. nobody trusts him. if you learn to not trust someone and you're engaged with someone who is paranoid, you become paranoid yourself so you record everything. >> donald trump sows paranoia the way a preacher sews piety. he surrounds himself with mirrors of himself which is means relentless opportunists. recordings are the kind of evidence. >> this is john o'donnell was the president at the trump hotel and casino in the 1980s. he told the "washington post" about. this he said talking on the phone was a public experience. you never knew who else was listening. it all stems from -- >> he's done to it me. i've been in his presence and he's pressed the button and i've heard people talking on the other end.

everything is for display. this is what omarosa and michael cohen were conscious of. now they're first two members of the cult to flee and they're dangerous to him. >> do you remember when michael cohen was a great man, his attorney, he claims they went in and raid, whatever, and michael cohen said no. they were very respectful, excuse me. now he is disavowing michael cohen and side lining him like, oh, well, they was side line guy. no. michael cohen worked for him for a decade and was one of his closest allies in business. >> and you're right. i was flashing back top to that cabinet meeting. the raid had just happened. and he talked about it as an attack on america. he was so offended on michael cohen's behalf because michael cohen was such a principle gd map. that this was evidence of a justice department and a deep state gone mad. now michael cohen is like, don't

hire him as a lawyer. he won't serve you very well. >> how do you with a straight face, him and sarah sanders say, well, there is a tape of him speaking to michael cohen about the payments. yet he said he didn't know in advance about the payments. if someone asks if the president is lying or not, how can you with a straight face either not answer it or say no, he wasn't. >> by this time, i think everyone who enters the white house in the morning the work checks their dignity at the door. they check their common sense. they check their pride. and they're now working in, for a president who has lied more than 4,000 times. it is a lying shop. this is their product. deception. >> i used to say lying for trump and the people around him reflects it. at this point it is autonomic. they open their mouths and it

comes out. they're running from the truth because the truth will slay them. >> even maggie was talking about the difference, how this was different. it appears his behavior is different and maybe even worse than after the "access hollywood" tape. some say they believe this is beginning of the end. do you believe it? >> i do. when you look back at what happened with watergate, there were almost two speier passed between the first news of the break-in and nixon's departure. i expect trump to depart. i don't think he'll serve four years. i imagine that he will tell us that we don't deserve him. he will say it is all very unfair, stamp his feet and depart and the country may be all the better for it. >> thank you. guess who is up next. someone who knows ball watergate. dan rather. we'll be right back. if you have psoriasis, ...

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